The weary musings of a time-served estate agent (realtor) somewhere in the UK. If you want advice on the property market, or alternative careers to this one, let me know, I might reply. In the meantime I'm plagued by cretinous idiots who I work with and for, and who may well feature in my diary at some time.

Monday, June 04, 2012

Fascist Regime - Sunday

I don’t know half these people.’ I tell my wife, as we
turn up at the Jubilee street party to celebrate 60 years of the Queen’s reign.
In 1977 I bought The Sex Pistols, God Save The Queen, convinced anarchy would
be a good thing for the UK. Now a load of royalists in 1950’s frocks they
bought from one of countless charity shops in the blighted High Street, are
singing rather engaging patriotic songs. Time and bags of equity in your home
can soften the angriest of left-wingers.

I’m expecting some wag to buttonhole me and complain
about property prices after a few glasses of punch. The old feisty attitude I
wore, along with numerous lapel badges when punk rock was at its height, has
been submerged for much of my working life. Hidden behind a sales’ smile and the
slow leeching of establishment values into a philosophy that looks more and
more flawed the farther into mortgages, pensions and savings you get sucked. I
haven’t gobbed at anyone for thirty years.

Several drinks in and after three plays of a Vera Lynn
compilation on the PA system, I start to loosen up. ‘This isn’t as bad as I
thought it was going to be.’ I slur to my wife when she detaches herself from a
gaggle of middle-aged women with dyed hair and vein-lined legs.

‘See,’ she admonishes gently. ‘These are really nice
people. They’re the same as you.’

And the uncomfortable realisation I normally get in the
shaving mirror, washes over me and replaces the light-headed rush of alcohol.
With unwelcome clarity, I see I’m not the idealist with a full head of hair and
a 32-inch waist any longer. I’m the same as them – just with better legs.

‘You’re the estate agent right?’ Questions the bloke from
several doors up who washes his Audi TT as if it’s his penis. I don’t know his
name and have decided he’s a knob, at least until he wants a valuation. I give
a cautious affirmative and paste on the smile that used to be a snarl when I
played Neat Neat Neat by The Damned, at full volume. I’m expecting some
one-sided diatribe about prices and parasites, but he surprises me just as the
Glen Miller album replaces Vera.

‘So what do you reckon on these solar roof panels then?’
The man asks eagerly, gleaming eyes of a zealot as bright as his motor’s
metallic blue paintwork.

Now I have a tricky decision to make. One not helped by
several glasses of disarmingly fruity punch and the bouncy beat of a big band I
used to hate with a passion. I have to quickly remember if his roof has
succumbed to the ugly panels, I’m convinced will turn out to be as big a
miss-selling scandal as Endowments and Payment Protection Insurance, in time.
It hasn’t. So I tell him what I think, in an uncharacteristic – in public –
rush of honesty. There’s an uncomfortable silence then he laughs and says.

‘Yep, me too, I reckon they’re a bloody eyesore. Bunch of
Polar Bear loving Greens with more money than sense buy them just to sop their
conscience. It’ll take decades to get the money back and I’m betting the panels
won’t still be working.’

‘Some nice people here.’ I slur to my wife as I start to
feel semi-detached. Then the royalist versus republican argument breaks out
from nowhere, as someone plays the National Anthem. While the temperature rises
and storm clouds gather, a lairy bloke - who must be renting - starts to
bad-mouth the Queen and I find myself reluctantly defending her. Obviously I
can’t do the same for Charles, his tree hugging and his hangers on. It’s only
thirty-five years since the bondage trousers and The Buzzcocks, after all.

‘That wasn’t helpful.’ Hisses my wife as the party
disperses and the rain starts to fall. She has a point. I thought I’d defuse
the situation by posing the Diana v Camilla question and asking who would shag
Camilla?

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